The invention relates to diesel locomotives and, more particularly, to a system for protecting, and saving fuel consumed by, a diesel locomotive engine.
When diesel locomotives are out-of-service, it has been conventional practice to run the engines of locomotive units full time during cool weather to prevent freezing of the cooling water and consequent damage to the engine as well as to avoid the difficulties of starting an engine when it is cool. This practice is extremely wasteful of fuel and consequently costly.
However, if the engine can be started and permitted to operate for a sufficient amount of time, its temperature will increase to a point at which cooling may occur over a considerable point before a restart will be necessary, owing to the large cooling water capacity and engine mass.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to provide a system for automatically starting of a diesel locomotive engine to maintain its temperature at or above a safe level.
It is an object of the invention to provide such a system which automatically provides unattended operation of such diesel locomotive engines only when necessary to maintain the engine temperature between first and second values and which will terminate engine operation when the temperature of the engine cooling water has reached a sufficient level.
It is also an object of the invention to provide such a system which avoids costly modification or redesign of engine control and electrical systems.
Another object of the invention is to provide such a system which allows normal deactivation or disconnection of the engine battery when the locomotive is out-of-service and which will automatically effectuate requisite reconnection of the battery for automatically starting the engine.
A further object of the invention is to provide such a system which will provide audible warning, upon the engine failing to start, if the temperature should fall to a level at which there would be danger from freezing.
A further object of the invention is to provide such a system which provides audible warning if the system is not activated upon the engine being placed out-of-service.
It is also an object of the invention to provide such a system which will automatically drain the cooling water if the temperature drops to a dangerous level.
A still further object of the invention is the provision of such a system which will automatically override the engine governor function which sometimes interferes with engine starting and which will, accordingly, provide for automatic actuation of the low governor oil pressure reset mechanism during engine starting.
It is an object of the invention also to provide such a system which can be installed on diesel locomotives easily and inexpensively either by retrofitting or during locomotive manufacture.
Other objects and features will be in part apparent and in part pointed out hereinbelow.